How to network with other blogs

This is a step by step guide on how to network with other blogs.

Find a blog similar to yours

Comment on the blog

Link to the blog

You find a blog which is similar in size and status to your own. Observe the blog to determine whether the blog is updated as often as yours, whether the blog has good content and whether you would like to associate your blog with that blog. Commenting is always appreciated, and linking even more.

Find a blog similar to yours

This is done by using the social networking sites you should already belong to. I like to rate blogs based on the amount of entrecard credits it costs to advertise on them and based on their project wonderful traffic. If their entrecard advertising costs about the same as mine and if they get roughly the same amount of traffic, I know this blog has a similar status to mine.

While you may also try to interact with the huge blogs out there, it is a better idea to build mutually beneficial relationships with blogs of a similar stature. A huge blog like pro blogger has nothing to gain by networking with you. As an example, my main blog The Necro Files reviews heavy metal albums and horror films. I regularly interact with the following blogs:

These blogs enjoy roughly the same target marget as I do. We each have something to offer to the other, and thus we enjoy regular interaction. A good guideline is to ask yourself: would you subscribe to the RSS feed of that blog? If the answer is yes, you have a networking buddy.

Comment on the blog

There are some great commenting scripts out there. I do not really receive lots of comments on my blog per se, but I do comment on other blogs regularly. Since you may provide a link to your blog in comments, this is a great way to spread the word about your blog.

Also remember that you may comment on social networking sites too. I tend to do this when a comment on my blog is not relevant to the topics covered on the blog of the person who left the comment.

Link to the blog

You want people to find your blog. The mutually beneficial way to ensure this is to help people find other blogs too!

List a blog roll on your blog. This is a widget that has a list of blogs you enjoy.

Write a review for another blog that is similar to your blog. A little bit of ego stroking never hurt anyone.

Give a postive remark about a blog that is similar to yours in one of your posts.

Remember, always seek mutual benefit whenever possible. If you want something, you have to be able to give something in return.

Blogger social networks

You need to sign up for these, and you do need to include a widget or some code on your blog. This is a minor inconvenience and is actually part of social networking fun.

Bookmark sites

Although many bloggers report getting steady traffic from these, I don't really. There is a quick and easy way to submit your posts to quite a few bookmark sites at the click of a button. It is called OnlyWire. Before you get all excited, many people have expressed concern about OnlyWire.

I have used OnlyWire for about a month. I enjoy the convenience of submitting my posts to a myriad of bookmark sites with minimal effort, and although I have not noticed a huge growth in traffic, it is worth it because I get various links back to my blog.

Recommendation sites

For the purpose of easy classification, I list the following as recommendation sites:

Digg

This is a catalogue that offers users the change to digg or undigg posts. You may submit your own posts. I haven't had much success with digg, and unless your blog is of an overly technical nature, digg will not pick up on it easily.

Entrecard

A recommendation system most people have trouble with. I have had the most success with entrecard. The quick and easy way to be successful with entrecard can be found on Lisa's World, so I won't go into that further.

Stumble Upon

Also a moody system, which has given me loads of traffic on occassion. The key is to interact with other similar stumblers. Stumble Upon offers you a great opportunity to network with like minded Internet users, all of whom are potentially interested in your blog. You need to install a browser plug in. I use firefox so I am not sure if it works on Internet Explorer.

27 April 2008

Building traffic to your blog is the key to making money from your blog. It is not as simple as it sounds, because if you market your blog to your regular readers, you are preaching to the choir. You need to market your blog to those who are not on your blog, while still keeping the loyalty of those who are regular readers.

Great content is the key to traffic

It is not that hard to get a single post on Stumble Upon or on Digg. What is hard is to prevent your blog from showing a peak in traffic, which returns to 10 or 20 hits per day shortly after. You need to build consistent traffic.

The key to enjoying consistent traffic to your blog is to provide great content. We have already dealt with the format you should use, namely the inverted pyramid style of writing. We will cover how to write great content here.

Write at least five cornerstone posts

Market your cornerstone posts

Network with other blogs

Encourage other blogs to network with you

Link back to your other cornerstone posts

I build traffic to my main blog, The Necro Files, by using tips from dosh dosh, ProBlogger and One Cool Site. This series of posts on how to build traffic to your blog is based on their advice and my own experiences using their advice.

Write at least five cornerstone posts

A cornerstone post is a post that teaches your reader something. Most how to make money blogs are based around cornerstone posts. It is a tutorial that is extremely useful.

This proves to be a problem for certain niche blogs that do not cater for readers who want to learn how to do something. My main blog reviews heavy metal albums and horror films. It is difficult to write a tutorial on those topics. Here are a few ideas for five cornerstones:

write a series of posts on the same topic or the same product

write a series of posts on related products

write a series of posts which give information to your readers about your topic

I have written a few successful series, sometimes months apart. The idea is to use one of your cornerstone posts as a flagship to promote the other related cornerstone posts when

you link from your flagship cornerstone post to your other cornerstone posts.

you link to the flaghsip cornerstone posts of a different series

This solves the problem of getting one day of peak traffic and the next day very little. Readers who like your flagship post will want to read further, so they follow the links and browse around your blog. While you are publishing the cornerstone posts, one per day, you also create anticipation for the next post. This is a great way to win readers and create a buzz around your blog.

22 April 2008

I recently joined Project Wonderful. Project Wonderful is an advertising network. You install the Project Wonderful widget on your blog. This widget hosts several squares of advertising spots. How many squares you want, the size of the squares - that is up to you. How do you make money from Project Wonderful?

Project Wonderful - how does it work?

Most advertising affiliates work with click-through rate or some other means of measuring traffic to determine your income. Project Wonderful determines your income from the amount an advertiser is willing to spend to advertise on your blog.

Advertising is sold on daily basis. The amount of money an advertiser is willing to spend acts like a bid for that advertiser. The highest bidder wins, and his ad is displayed on the square.

Each square may have individual bids. Bids pay for daily advertising, regardless of traffic and regardless of clicks. Highest bidder wins, Project Wonderful takes a percentage and you get to own the difference!

This is a wonderful way to generate income, if you'll pardon the pun. You can adjust the minimum amount you would like advertisers to bid on your site. My advice is to keep this initial value low - no more than $0.01 or $0.02 for a site that gets less than 50 hits per day.

once you are a member, sign in to Project Wonderful and click on 'My Ad Boxes'

way at the bottom of the page, you will find a link 'create a new ad box'. Click on it

adjust the amount of rows and columns you would like in your widget. You can also set the size of the ad squares you like here

grab the code, and put it on your blog

it might be a good idea to upload a custom 'your ad here' image. Just ensure that the custom image is the correct size. In my case, the 'your ad here' image of my main blog, The Necro Files, is 125 x 125 pixels. I made my images with The GIMP. The GIMP is small, cheap and relatively easy to use. You can also use it on Microsoft Windows. Try it!

Advantages of Project Wonderful

the minimum payout is only $10

you can earn as little or as much as advertisers are willing to bid per ad

once you have an account, you can advertise on other Project Wonderful widgets too

Drawbacks of Project Wonderful

The only drawback I can think of is once you have a widget on your blog, you can't adjust the minimum bidding amount while there are active bids. This is not really a disadvantage. It makes sense not to adjust the minimum bid while you have ads running. The only way you can do this is by stopping all the ads - which I don't want to do because those ads are already paid for.

Fortunately, you can easily add another Project Wonderful widget to your blog! I left the minimum bid at $0.00 for a widget with less than optimal visibility, and added a new widget with a slightly higher minimum bid.